Kirkuk lies in a wide zone with an enormously diverse population and has been multilingual for centuries. There were dramatic demographic changes during Kirkuk's urbanization in the twentieth century, which saw the development of distinct ethnic groups.Kurds, Turkmen and Arabs lay conflicting claims to this zone, and all have their historical accounts and memories to buttress their claims.

Chaldean Catholic Archeparchy of Kirkuk-Sulaimaniya

The Chaldean Catholic Archeparchy of Kirkuk (Arabic:ابرشية كركوك الكلدانية‎) is an archeparchy of the Chaldean Catholic Church in communion with the Pope in Rome. The archdeparchy was created in the early years of the nineteenth century. Its present ordinary, Archbishop Yousif Thomas Mirkis, was consecrated in 2014.

Background

The Chaldean archdiocese of Kirkuk was the successor to the classical diocese of Karka d'Beth Slokh, the metropolis of the ecclesiastical province of Beth Garmaï. The region of Beth Garmaï in southern Iraq, bounded by the Lesser Zab and Diyala rivers and centered on the town of Karka d'Beth Slokh (modern Kirkuk), was a metropolitan province of the Church of the East between the fifth and fourteenth centuries, whose metropolitans resided first at Shahrgard, then at Karka d'Beth Slokh, later at Shahrzur and finally at Daquqa. The known suffragan dioceses of Beth Garmaï included Shahrgard, Lashom, Mahoze d'Arewan, Radani, Hrbath Glal, Tahal and Shahrzur.